Beloved Flowers
by Akino Matoumiken
Summary: On the night of Tenten's birthday, as she was heading to open the window to gaze at the starfilled sky, she finds a flower wrapped in ribbons. This goes on until her 16th birthday. What happens then? Find out in this Oneshot of Neji X Tenten fluff wishes


Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. If I did, I would have killed off someone as it is already… oh well here comes, my first fanfic of this series even though it's been awhile since I've written anything.

"Happy 13th birthday to the Flower of Konoha!" shouted Gai sensei. They were all gathered in some corner of the forest not far from Konoha to celebrate Ten-Ten's birthday.

"Don't call me that! I don't want to be a flower but I'll let it go for today." Ten-ten sighs.

"Well, open your present first and then we'll have cake. It's from all of us together." Lee told Ten-ten enthusiastically.

"Awww thanks for such a nice little celebration. Well let's see" as Ten-ten began to unravel the ribbon from the box.

It was a beautiful day for a day where spring was about to begin in Konoha. All went nicely and despite the small gathering, Ten-ten enjoyed herself regardless. She was recalling the best bits and pieces of the day and then took a look at her bedroom window and took a look outside. To add to the beautiful day, it looked as if it was going to be a beautiful night, so she decided to open the window and take a nice thorough look as if to take in these memories into her mind. When she opened her window, something glistened on her window sill. She couldn't clearly see it in the dark, so she took a closer look. It was a white carnation draped with two yellow ribbons that also attaches a note. In that note wrote, "For an innocent flower, I give these ribbons for your lovely petals." It was short, but sweet and unfortunately, unsigned. Ten-ten was puzzled yet found this gift to be the one that left her the biggest impression. No one came to mind when she thought of the identity of this person. This was something that was going to leave her mystified for the next few years.

For the next 2 years, she looked at the ledge on her bedroom window on her birthday to find a different kind of flower wrapped in 2 ribbons and a note signed what looked like a t on top of a z. This was a clue for the mysterious individual, which by the end confused her even more since she couldn't think who would have given this gift. She kept these flowers and would occasionally use these ribbons. When she didn't use these ribbons, she put them in her what you could call jewelry box that only contained the notes and the ribbons.

On her 16th birthday, this was the first year that everyone on her team gave her something individually. This was also the first year that Neji couldn't make it as he was assigned a mission abut a week ago and has not returned yet. She was saddened by that reality since she had grown quite attached to this prodigy and had fallen for him in secret. She wasn't sure if he had felt the same as he was pretty expression-less most times, so it was not easy to read his emotions, which is an asset when you're a shinobi. The celebration was still nice, but it didn't feel quite the same. She was in a way anxious to return home and was thinking eagerly whether she would find another flower. She glanced at her window and found no flower.

You could say that she was disappointed. Ten-ten wasn't quite sure why she was disappointed that the flower had not come since she still had no idea who could have given it to her. Yet, she felt that her birthday wasn't quite complete without it. Not wanting to really think about this, she decided to go to sleep. Hours later, she heard some pebbles being thrown to her window as if to grab her attention. At first she thought she had imagined it. Soon after, more pebbles were thrown finally waking her up. As she got up and opened her window, a piece of paper flew in and landed on her head. She was half tempted to throw it out because she wasn't the most awake and was partly angry thinking that some stupid kid had nothing to do at night than to deprive people of sleep. That was until she noticed how the note ended with TZ. Her eyes opened wide and sat down on her bed and read "The flower you seek will be found only tonight in the gleam of the moonlight in the forest of this country. You will find it by pursuing a trail of yellow tags on trees. Collect them to ensure no one follows you."

She wasn't really up to getting out, much less changing out of her pajamas to find this flower. In the back of her mind, she heard a voice calling her to go. She debated for a few more seconds and not wanting to wake anyone in the house, she snuck out her window still with her night clothes but she wore her sandals. She entered the forest and began looking around for those yellow tags. Little by little, she found the tags, which at last lead her to a small clearing. Just when the moonlight shined on the clearing, as if on cue, on the far left side, an orchid bloomed in front her eyes. Next to the orchid, her eyes caught sight of another piece of paper. All the paper said was "Look above you." Puzzled by such a ridiculously short sentence, she followed the paper and saw a ribbon tied to a branch and an abnormal shadow by that branch. She jumped up and began untying the ribbon. The ribbon was white as snow with silver flowers embedded lightly on. Once she finished untying it, she felt a presence close to her and she quickly turned around to only see a very familiar face. Shocked by the sudden appearance, she slipped off the branch and nearly fell if not for the arm that caught a hold of her and held her tight closely.

"What are you doing here?" she asked when she caught her breath.

"I just finished the mission and came back. Why?" he asked her with a perplexed face.

"I just didn't –" she stopped and blushed furiously as soon as she realized she was sitting on him and was about to get off. She couldn't get up properly as his arm gripped her arm, making her sit down.

"But –" she protested but was cut off by his finger on her lip. He said nothing, but took the ribbon in her hand and began to tie it to her hair, which was tied in pigtails. In his pocket came another ribbon that was identical and he wrapped it around her other tress. Speechless, she looked at him and asked "How did you know I was going to be here?"

He lifted her up and laid her back down leaning on the tree and stood up. He raised her chin with two fingers and brushed his lips to hers lightly for a few moments. Then he whispered in his ears and said "Happy sweet 16th. I'm sorry I made you go all the way here, but the orchid looked better here than on the ledge of your window." And left what seemed like a blink of an eye. Ten-ten was dazed, pinched herself to make sure she isn't hallucinating and said "kai" to make sure this wasn't some gengitsu. She fingered her lips again and recalled how he had softer lips than it looked. This was much better than a flower on the window sill indeed.

The following day was supposed to be a training day, but Gai decided to make it a day off as he found out Neji had just returned and allowed him to rest after a long mission. Ten-ten was in her room still pondering about last night. She wondered what he meant with the words he said to her ear. "Could it be? He's not the type of person that would do this in the light of day. Was he the one that sent me them all along? It can't be. He doesn't have a T nor a Z in his name." She sat on her bed thinking of this until she heard her mother open the door. As it was a day off, she wasn't expecting to really see anyone at the door, let alone Neji. "Is Ten-ten here? I need to talk to her." he asked her mother. Not really understanding why he was there, she told her mom she'll be back later.

They were walking silently for awhile until Ten-ten was unable to withstand the awkward silence between the two. Ten-ten faced him and decided to ask him. "So, what did you want to talk about?" It was then, she noticed that his usual expression-less face showed that he was actually somewhat nervous and could see a tinge of red on his face. "I'm… um…" He turned around as if to hide something and continued, "Sorry for … the sudden attempt last night. That's all." Ten-ten's eyes were wide and she blinked as if her mind was registering what he said. As soon as it finished, she couldn't help but chuckle lightly. It seemed it was as if it was something automatic covering her anxiety, or her thinking of the irony that she actually liked it. Neji, on the other hand was stupefied at this sort of reaction. Consequently, he met his eyes to her and without even uttering a word, his eyes told all; "Why are you laughing?" they showed. Ten-ten finally stopped and told him, smiling "I'm sorry for laughing. It's just that I didn't expect you to apologize for doing something so nice to me." As she finished, Neji's face brightened just a bit and his mouth grew to a small smile. He closed the distance between them, brought her close to him. He slid her forehead protector down and kissed her on the forehead and whispered "I guess you feel the same I take it?" "Why on the forehead when you can do this?" She asked right before laying her lips on his. Moments later, as if a light bulb shined, it finally came to her that the T Z was neither a T nor a Z, but a H and N stuck together sideways. "Why didn't you just write HN properly on those notes all this time?" she asked him afterwards. "A ninja must read beneath the underneath right?" was all he said.

FIN

So what did you think? Wow 3 whole pages Oo. My apologies if the characters were fairly OCC, but this is just Neji X Ten-Ten fluff so erhm yeah ;;; I know the last bit was Kakashi's quote right? I couldn't help it. It worked well with it. R&R?


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